Wires such as electrical flat wires or cables are used in construction and other building projects to run electricity and other electrical connections therein. In such projects, fasteners (e.g., staples, nails, etc.) are used by workers (e.g., construction workers, electricians, etc.) to mount the wires to structures or other mounting objects. The wires must be mounted and retained in a proper manner to preserve the integrity and insulation of the wires for electrical performance and fire safety reasons. Also, because wires are typically run over long distances, for example, throughout a building under construction, workers often must use hundreds, if not thousands, of fasteners to secure the wires along the way. The repeated task of installing or mounting wires with fasteners exposes workers to the risk of personal injury. For example, workers may accidentally drive fasteners into their fingers instead of the wall studs or hammer strike their fingers instead of the fasteners.
There exist a number of products in the construction and home improvement industries for use to protect wires during their installation. For example, companies such as Ideal™, Arrow Faster Co.™, and King Manufacturing Co., Inc.™ offer staples with plastic (e.g., polyethylene) insulators attached thereto to form insulated staples. That is, each insulated staple is formed by inserting a staple through holes or openings in the plastic insulator, which interfaces between the staple and a wire, to insulate the wire as it is secured to a mounting object by the staple. U.S. Design Pat. No. D330,699, assigned on its face to W. W. Cross, Inc. illustrates an example of a conventional insulated staple. The plastic insulator also may serve as a handle for holding with a user's thumb and forefinger as the user drives the staple (e.g., with a hammer) to a mounting object, such as a construction frame or wall stud. However, the conventional insulated staple does not have sufficient room on its plastic insulator for a user (e.g., a worker) to properly but safely hold the insulated staple for driving it to a mounting object. Thus, typically, a part of the user's thumb and/or finger is exposed over the staple area and subjected to the driving force (e.g., a hammering force) that the user employs to drive the staple to the mounting object. Consequently, the user risks personal injury as the user repeatedly mounts insulated staples to secure the installation of a wire along its length.
Accordingly, there is a desire for a wire protector and fastener that provides added safety to its users.